Different Lullabies
by Little-Night-Roses
Summary: Hazelle Hawthorne and Iris Everdeen never had much in common. Or did they? Perhaps it's time to go back to the start and discover what happened long before their children met in the woods. This is their story, from the beginning right until the very end. A tale of friendship, or maybe something less than that.
1. Chapter 1

**Hey, so this is just the first chapter. I'm thinking of taking it right to the end of Mockingjay. Tell me what you guys think, I'd love to hear some feedback.**

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They're different from the beginning, but in some ways they're the same. They're both born in District 12, both born mid-winter and both with dark blue eyes. They're both rocked by their mothers, to the same old song as they drift to sleep.

_Hush little baby don't you cry, momma's gonna sing you a lullaby_

Iris is born in the merchant side of town, to proud parents who cherish their only child and dote on her endlessly. Why wouldn't they? She's perfect. Hazelle's mother thinks her daughter is perfect too, but she can barely feed her let alone shower her with gifts. She's born in the Seam and never knows who her father was.

Iris is two years older, fair haired, with a tinkling laugh that lights up those around her. Sometimes Hazelle laughs too, and it's warm and enchanting when she does, but there isn't much to laugh about in the Seam. Not when you're starving, and cold, and your mother has to creep out every night to some unknown place in order to set even the smallest scraps of food on the table.

They go to school together, though they're not in the same class. They don't even talk with one another. Seam kids don't mix with the merchant kids, that's the unspoken rule in the District 12 playground. Don't let them play your games, or share your lunch. Don't even talk to them unless it's necessary. So while Iris giggles, shares secrets and plays skipping games with the Donner twins, Hazelle sticks with the kids from the Seam. They sit around the old oak in the school yard, listening intently while Abraham Everdeen sings aged songs about meadows and tree's. Iris doesn't hear him sing. Not until she's sixteen and she wanders to the wrong side of town early one morning. But that's another story. Till then, she is happily content to play frivolous games, to swap clothing and jewellery with her friends, to steal glances at that cute boy who's father runs the bakery.

Iris never has to sign up for tesserae, she never needs to. Why would she? Not that it would matter anyway, she tells herself. It's not like she'll ever be reaped, it's not like the games will ever really affect her. It's the kids from the Seam who should be worried, kids from the Seam who have their names in there more times than most of them can count. The games will never affect her, Iris decides.

And then she turns fifteen, and that summer Maysilee Donner gets reaped. A merchant girl, Iris's close friend. Surely that can't be true, why her? Iris runs through this in her mind. Why someone who has a loving family, a life full of potential waiting ahead? Why couldn't it be someone else, someone from the Seam? That's where the three other District 12 tributes's came from, that desolate forsaken side of town. Why not some scruffy, starved girl from there? Why not….Iris stops for a moment to think of someone from the Seam, some unfortunate urchin to wish this fate upon instead….why not that Hazelle Caldwell girl? She's bound to starve to death at some point soon anyway; why not let the games get it over with? It's not like she even has a family who will mourn her, just a mother who everyone knows visits Cray's backdoor to keep her and the girl alive.

Iris convinces herself that Maysilee will win, that there is no other possible outcome than her victory. And then her friend dies, covered in blood all the while being comforted by a boy from the Seam. That boy wins, and Iris doesn't think she can possibly hate anyone more. Maysilee's parents give her their daughter's songbird, and Iris cries for a week and forgets to feed the poor thing. It's soon as dead as its previous owner, and as starved as one of those kids from the Seam.

Hazelle doesn't watch the games that year. She doesn't watch any year. What's the point? Every year it's the same, District 12 gets the least screen time out of all the Districts, the tributes are usually dead within fifteen minutes or less and Hazelle doesn't want to watch that. She wants to watch the Quarter Quell even less, because this year she personally knows one of the tributes. Haymitch Abernathy is a few years older than her, but Seam kids always stick together and she remembers him sitting with her and the rest of them under that oak tree. He helped her up once when she tripped on her way to school. And Hazelle didn't want to watch him die. What chance did he have anyway? There's no way he could win against forty seven others, some of whom are trained to be lethal, deadly. Hazelle doesn't watch. In the back of her head she has another good reason. Hazelle is a realist. She's only thirteen but she isn't a dreamer. She knows her chances aren't good. The odds are one year her name will come out of that Reaping bowl, and she'll be swept off the games. Hazelle knows she won't win, that she can't win. So she avoids the games like the plague, refuses to watch. She doesn't want to know exactly what terror is coming towards her. If she's reaped she wants to go calmly, without images of the games in her mind. Hazelle's decided, if that's how her life will end she will not spend her last few days in fear. She won't let the games haunt her. Hazelle knows she would die early in the games, Seam kids always do.

But then Haymitch Abernathy wins, and District 12 goes into celebration for days. No one lingers on the fact that three of the Districts children were brutally killed, only remembered by their closest friends and family who don't turn up to the festivities at all, and aren't mentioned. Iris lies huddled in bed and refuses to talk when her parents try to coax her downstairs. Hazelle goes to the party in the town square, this is the first time she's seen a celebration and this is the first time anything exciting happens to her. This is the first time she talks to Jacob Hawthorne. She's known him for years, because his family lives three doors down. He's another one who spent days under the oak tree, laughing with the others. They've never spoken though, and neither one of them is sure why because he's always found her pretty and she always enjoyed listening to his stories. By the time the festivities end that night, Jacob and Hazelle are holding hands, and Hazelle thinks she might finally have a reason to be happy.

Iris pulls her bedcovers further over her head and lets the tears fall freely.


	2. Chapter 2

It's early one morning when Iris sneaks out of her room and finds herself on her way to the Seam. She's never been before and she's not entirely sure why she's going now, just before six o'clock in the morning, in her white night dress. It's not until she's there that Iris realises that it's in the back of her head to confront Haymitch Abernathy. To make him feel the pain that she feels, for him to feel the guilt he deserves for winning when Maysilee died. She doesn't know he's already tried to drown himself in alcohol several times since he came home. What she does know is that Maysilee's sister will probably never recover from the loss of her twin, and that Haymitch's younger brother has been going around town proudly talking about his hero of a brother and spending Victor money with all the naivety of his ten year old self and Iris is sick of it.

But now the sun has started to rise, and she's come to her senses. He wouldn't even be in the Seam anymore, not now that he had that fancy, isolated home in the Victors Village. Not that finding him would help. There's nothing that will bring her friend back, nothing that will help ease Iris's pain.

And then she hears it. That soft, sweet voice which had so often entertained under the oak tree. Iris has never heard it before and to her, in the cold bright sunrise, it seems that she is about to be approached by an angel.

The boy stops his singing and smiles when he see's her. He jokingly asks what a merchant girl is doing on the wrong side of town. He makes her smile and that's how it all starts. The secret meetings on the outskirts of town, the stolen glances between them at school. No one can ever find out, Iris tells him. No one will ever find out, she assures herself. Her parents would be horrified. Iris brushes that off though. After all, they're just friends, and why should she follow some silly schoolyard rule about not mixing with the Seam kids. She'd grown up hearing rumours about them, those boys from the Seam. How they were rude, and untidy and only after one thing. Back then Iris had believed all that. But then again she'd never actually spoken to anyone from the Seam until she met Abraham. And he was different from the others, or maybe he was the same, Iris had no idea. But he had a smile that made her feel happy again, and when he sang to her all the birds in the tree's stopped to listen. It was early one morning while he was singing some song about meeting up at a tree as they walked together that Iris had a realization about Abraham. She was in love with him.

They never meet up in town, or anywhere that they can be seen. She's terrified someone will see them, and he agrees that it's for the best. That's why Iris is horrified when one day he comes into her parents apothecary, two of his Seam friends in tow. Jacob Hawthorne's mother has a cough, it seems, and he's there to get something for her throat. There's no explanation to why Abraham is there with him. Just tagging along it seems. Hazelle is there too, holding Jacob's hand, and she asks Iris how her day's been going. Iris gives a polite, short answer and shoots Abraham a look before scurrying off and leaving her father to deal with the customers.

Abraham sings the song about the tree under his breath while Jacob pays for his mothers medicine, and Iris's father ushers them out quickly after the purchase has been made and tells them not to come back. Iris, who had been hovering in the back room asks him why. Because songs like that are forbidden, he tells her. Songs like that are from the days before the rebellion and the penalty attached to them is severe. Iris isn't quite sure how a song could be dangerous, and her father doesn't go into more detail on the subject. He's not keen on those Seam kids anyway, he tells his daughter. The medicine was probably paid for with stolen money, and he doesn't want his business getting a bad name. _Don't you go getting involved with any of those Seam kids_, he warns her gently. _You'll only end up in trouble_.

He goes to restock the shelves and Iris goes up to her room. She sits on her bed and quietly starts to cry. Her fathers warning about not getting involved with Seam kids has come too late. She's already in love with one.

Iris doesn't go to their meeting places for several weeks. She takes hear father's advice and stays away from _that boy_. She avoids him if she see's him in town and tries to get the forbidden songs he had sung out of her head. It's all hopeless though. Iris finally breaks down one day, and tells Robbie Mellark all about her trips to the Seam, the birds stopping to listen and her fathers words. She tells him how she feels about the boy from the Seam. The one with the twinkle in his eyes and the forbidden songs on his lips. Robbie's always been sweet to her, understanding, and this incident is no exception. He tells Iris to go and follow her heart, with a sad look in his eyes. He tells her that no good ever comes from hiding your feeling from someone you love, and she wonders who it is that Robbie's hiding feelings for.

Within minutes Iris is in the Seam, calling Abraham's name. She ran all the way there, not caring who saw the desperation in her eyes. It's been weeks, and she needs his smile, his laughter. She calls for him, and soon enough he's there. He's always there when she needs him, when she wants him. She throws her arms around his neck and taste's his kiss for the very first time. He holds her tight and tells her he's never letting go of her again. The stand on the edge of the Seam, wrapped tightly in each other's embrace. From that day on that's the way they stay.

And then her parents find out.


End file.
